Circular Economy and Regeneration of Building Stock …
293
Fig. 1 Changing the building renovation process and stakeholders’ relationships towards a circular
building renovation process. The orange lines represent the links that have to be enabled in a circular
building process
in the urban site, such as materials, waste, water and energy flows. The microlevel is also discussed in a significant number of studies (e.g. Smol et al. 2015),
particularly when it comes to considering the exchange of by-products and waste
between different industrial sectors (industrial symbiosis) in order to produce new
products with recycled components (e.g. to use ash and sludge from purification
processes for producing construction products). Hence, the micro-level is linked
with an intersectoral approach based on the concept of the eco-industrial park and
industrial ecology developed in the early Nineties.
The application of the circular economy on a meso-level (Pomponi and
Moncaster 2017) is yet to be investigated in depth. There are studies (e.g. Cheshire
2016; Geldermans 2016) that give an impulse to the application of circular
economy principles at the building level, considering ‘buildings as material banks’.
In general, there are a number of principles which strongly characterize the circular
economy at the building level. These principles are classifiable in three main
groups: design process aimed at adaptability and reversibility; resource/waste
management aimed at reuse and recycling; business models aimed at extending life
and value of products while also changing the concept of ownership. Waste
prevention through the extension of the building life, product durability,
maintenance, repair, reuse, must be the first goal for an efficient and effective use of
resources.
Therefore, research about the circular economy at the building level is
fundamental because of the lack of studies in comparison to the micro and macro
levels, and because it is a link between these other two levels: circular requirements
(e.g. exchange and use of reused/recycled materials) at building level can activate
293
Fig. 1 Changing the building renovation process and stakeholders’ relationships towards a circular
building renovation process. The orange lines represent the links that have to be enabled in a circular
building process
in the urban site, such as materials, waste, water and energy flows. The microlevel is also discussed in a significant number of studies (e.g. Smol et al. 2015),
particularly when it comes to considering the exchange of by-products and waste
between different industrial sectors (industrial symbiosis) in order to produce new
products with recycled components (e.g. to use ash and sludge from purification
processes for producing construction products). Hence, the micro-level is linked
with an intersectoral approach based on the concept of the eco-industrial park and
industrial ecology developed in the early Nineties.
The application of the circular economy on a meso-level (Pomponi and
Moncaster 2017) is yet to be investigated in depth. There are studies (e.g. Cheshire
2016; Geldermans 2016) that give an impulse to the application of circular
economy principles at the building level, considering ‘buildings as material banks’.
In general, there are a number of principles which strongly characterize the circular
economy at the building level. These principles are classifiable in three main
groups: design process aimed at adaptability and reversibility; resource/waste
management aimed at reuse and recycling; business models aimed at extending life
and value of products while also changing the concept of ownership. Waste
prevention through the extension of the building life, product durability,
maintenance, repair, reuse, must be the first goal for an efficient and effective use of
resources.
Therefore, research about the circular economy at the building level is
fundamental because of the lack of studies in comparison to the micro and macro
levels, and because it is a link between these other two levels: circular requirements
(e.g. exchange and use of reused/recycled materials) at building level can activate